


Jailbreak

by inwhispersandscreams



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-09
Updated: 2012-12-09
Packaged: 2017-11-20 18:16:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,963
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/588273
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/inwhispersandscreams/pseuds/inwhispersandscreams
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Aurora ran, as fast as her body could take her, feet slapping hard on the asphalt. Her chest felt tight, small licks of fire circling her lungs as she drew in each breath with a ragged pant, body telling her to stop, and let the pursuers behind her catch her, but she couldn’t. They were all counting on her, held in the dungeons of the fort, and only she could set them all free again. She couldn’t just <em>give up,</em> but her muscles ached from running, and her throat felt aflame from the effort of it all. Risking one glance backwards, Aurora gave a yelp as she saw her pursuer round the corner, darting forward and around the edge of the wall without a second thought.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Jailbreak

**Author's Note:**

> Unbeta-ed, so all mistakes are mine. Enjoy!

Aurora ran, as fast as her body could take her, feet slapping hard on the asphalt. Her chest felt tight, small licks of fire circling her lungs as she drew in each breath with a ragged pant, body telling her to _stop_ , and let the pursuers behind her catch her, but she couldn’t. They were all counting on her, held in the dungeons of the fort, and only she could set them all free again. She couldn’t just _give up_ , but her muscles ached from running, and her throat felt aflame from the effort of it all. Risking one glance backwards, Aurora gave a yelp as she saw her pursuer round the corner, darting forward and around the edge of the wall without a second thought.

There was no way she could outrun them – that much Aurora knew. She’d never been the fastest or the most athletic of the girls, but she’d always been the smartest. _My smart little girl_ , her mother had always said when her parents had received her semester grades, before enveloping her into a hug. Mulan was faster than Aurora, always beating her in the yearly athletic carnival that the primary school held, but Aurora didn’t mind so much. She preferred to read instead of racing around and tripping over her feet or the long dresses that she preferred to wear. They made her feel like a princess, especially when she twirled about, though they weren’t so good to wear when they all played chasey on the playground. They tangled around her feet or snagged on sticks, or got dirty if she tripped, and that always made her mother annoyed. But, at the same time, Aurora liked to be among all the other children, and liked to make them happy. Her mother’s sad eyes and nightmares made Aurora long for smiles to belong around her, rather than screams in the night and downturned smiles.

“I’m coming to get you, Rora!” Philip’s voice carried through the air, and the sound of his footfalls too loud and close for Aurora’s liking. Withholding a squeal, Aurora turned and looked for a hiding place, eyes falling onto the open door to the building. They weren’t _meant_ to be inside the school buildings during playtime, but if she didn’t take it, Philip would catch her, and all the caught robbers would be left arrested. Squeezing her eyes closed as if it made it her invisible, she darted inside the building and pulled the door closed, ducking down to hide as she waited to hear Philip pass her. Her heart thumped painfully loud in her ears as she waited, withholding her breath in case Philip heard it. And he _would_ , wouldn’t he? He always seemed to catch her, and he’d grin at her as he did so, before telling her off about her sticking a tongue out at him. _I’ll tell your mother!_ he’d cry, and that was usually enough for Aurora to automatically stop and stand up straight.

But not today. Today, _she_ was going to win.

His footsteps passed, Philip’s voice calling out to her growing fainter, but Aurora didn’t rise immediately. “One hippopotamus, _two_ hippopotamus, _three_ hippopotamus,” she counted, chest rising and falling quickly as she tried to catch her breath. All she had to do was break the other robbers out of the jail, and not get caught herself. She could do that… except Mulan was guarding the jail under the playground fort. Aurora had never been faster than Mulan, but she _was_ smarter. She could always just tag them through the window, rather than go through the door that Mulan would be guarding. Aurora grinned, rising up to open the door and peek out to see if Philip was nearby. Today, _he_ would be the one to lose, and _he_ would be the one getting told off for sticking his tongue out at her.

Seeing no Philip or other cop around the building, Aurora darted out, running as fast as she could – only to fall as she ran into another body.

“Oof!” was her exclamation as she fell backwards, hands reaching out to break her fall. Her palms stung as she came to a rest, a small exhalation of pain escaping her lips as she lifted up her hands to see the graze on the heel of her palm. “ _Ow_ ,” she moaned, pushing off the small pieces of dirt and debri that clung to her hand.

“What’d you do _that_ for?”

Aurora glanced at the dark haired boy in front of her, who blew at the palms of his own hands to stop the fiery sting that came from the graze, wincing as she saw that he too had been injured by her rapid flight from the hallway. “Sorry,” she said as she stood up and walked towards him, offering her hand to help him up. “I didn’t mean to, Killian!”

“What are you even _running_ from, _anyway_?” he asked, his bottom lip jutting out slightly as he brushed aside her hand and rose from the ground. “Don’t tell me that you’re scared of the sixth graders in there.” His chin jerked towards the building that Aurora had just exited, and she shook her head defiantly. She didn’t get _scared_ – mostly. She was scared of the nightmares her mother had, and the strange monsters that her mother drew in the art book that Aurora wasn’t meant to look at, but not of the _sixth_ graders. Just because they were big, didn’t mean they were _scary_. Snow had proved that when she’d kicked one in the shins and called it an ogre for being mean to her friend, Emma.

“ _No_ , I’m playing cops and robbers silly,” she explained, nodding her head firmly. “And Philip is going to catch me and put me in jail if he finds me, and then all the robbers will have been caught and we’ll have lost.” Her voice turned glum at the thought. “So I’m hiding, so I can stage a jailbreak and get them all free.”

“Sounds silly,” Killian returned, crossing his arms over his chest. “Why don’t the other robbers just free themselves?”

Aurora couldn’t help it – she giggled, and that only made Killian scowl. “They can’t just run away from _jail_ ,” she explained patiently. “You have to be _freed_. I have to go and tag them while Mulan guards them so they can escape, and not get caught by Philip or any of the other cops.”

Killian looked like he might have been about to say something, but the roar of Philip’s voice cut over him, the loud “ _RORA!_ ” causing Aurora to squeak. “It’s him!” she exclaimed, voice high and thin as her eyes darted about nervously to where she could hide. Could she make it back to the corridor in time? She twisted her body around, breathing increasing as she started to hear Philip’s footsteps approaching.

Killian’s fingers wrapped around her hand and he tugged. “Come _on_!” he whispered, pulling her towards the boundary fence of the school. She began to protest, but Killian simply shushed her and pulled her behind the thick bushes, their bodies pressed between the foliage of the bush and the brick wall that bordered the front of the school grounds. Through the foliage, Aurora could only see a little – Philip’s frame coming around the edge of the building and pausing at the front of the school as he called out her name again. He waited, and for one terrifying moment as her foot slipped and the bush shook – just a little – as her Mary Jane clad foot slid into shrubbery, Aurora feared that he knew just where the two of them hid. Instinctively, her hand tightened its grip on Killian’s, the pressure returned to her as Philip took a single step towards the bush. _He’s found us_.

“Philip, did you find her?”

“No!”

She dared not breathe, trying desperately to slow her heart. Philip could hear it, she was _sure_ of it. _No_ , she was meant to beat _him_ today, not the other way around! Drawing her feet back towards her, Aurora readied herself to make a blind, possibly hopeless dash away, only to feel her hand being squeezed tighter in warning. She looked back to Killian, who shook his head and pointed with a finger to where Philip stood. Aurora nodded, watching through the bush as Philip turned and headed away from the two of them and soon disappeared around the corner of the building.

Aurora sighed, slumping against the brick fence and expelling the breath she had been holding in a rush. “You’re _good_ at this,” she told Killian, smiling at him. “Hiding and all that. You’d be a great robber!”

“Yeah well…” He shifted away from her, only to remember suddenly that their hands were still linked, and suddenly drawing his hand out of hers and crossing his arms over his chest yet again. “I prefer to be a pirate _anyway_. I just didn’t want you to get caught – all those other robbers are counting on you, you know.”

“A pirate _is_ a robber,” she informed Killian, “they just sail the seas whereas robbers just… run around I guess!” She giggled, unable to quite stop herself, or the small red blush that rose up in her cheeks once he had withdrawn his hand. “So, we’re kind of the same. You should play with us sometime, and be on my team! Philip always likes to be the cop, but I don’t mind. Sometimes it’s fun to be a robber too, even if I’m not that good at it.” The smile faded slightly from her face, and Killian shifted uncomfortably next to her.

“But… you’re the last one.”

She nodded, gnawing on her bottom lip. “Yep, but that means I gotta free everyone. I’ve gotta sneak up on _Mulan_. She’s _always_ a cop too, and she’s _really_ good at it.” Her plan to run up to the window in the fort seemed to suddenly be inadequate to the young girl. How would she even get close enough to it, without being seen by the others?

“Well… I could… _help_ ,” Killian offered, his cheeks suddenly red for a reason that Aurora didn’t quite understand. “If a robber and a pirate are the _same_ ,” he said slowly, as if piecing together a puzzle, “then I _have_ to help you. So… what can we do?”

The plan was simple, distract and run. It wasn’t uncommon for others to join in once the game had started, and all Killian had to do was pretend that Philip had said he could avoid. It was easy, Aurora thought – after all, she knew all of Philip’s code words that he used, and it didn’t matter if Killian had captured Aurora, because he wasn’t _really_ part of the game anyway. It was a perfect plan, and they were the perfect combination of pirate and robber to pull of such a devious plan.

“Philip made me a cop,” Killian announced as they drew closer to the fort and Mulan. For her part, Mulan frowned, but nodded and let Killian and his captive past. “Said to tell you that the ogres have all been caught,” he continued as Aurora pressed a single finger to her lips and began to lead the other robbers out of the window. “And so I guess that means that you’d have won, right? Well, you would have, _if_ I was a cop.”

And then all stealth was abandoned as the robbers bolted in each and every direction, Aurora giggling as she watched the plan unfold.

“Less giggling Aurora, more running!” Killian screamed out as they ran, Mulan chasing after them.

“Next time, you’ll have to be on my team for real!” she yelled back, before careening around the corner.

Jailbreak _complete._


End file.
